My chronicle of my nearly fatal Saturn Return, and the misadventures I'm having since

Tag Archives: pregnancy

So things have picked up. Still so tired I could cheerfully put my head down on my desk and go straight to sleep at any given moment, but my belly started growing and strangers started commenting (positively). Now it feels real, and even the hard days are easier when I rub my belly and feel this baby making itself more room.

And then…

My dad called on the weekend. After a routine check up with his doctor (and then some more tests) he’s been diagnosed with Prostate Cancer. His surgery is in 9 weeks time. He had no symptoms at all. He’s only 64 years old.

As you can probably imagine, I’m a little bit of a mess over it. There are many families I know that have lost a family member around the time of a new arrival, and in the back of my mind I think I’ve sometimes thought that maybe there’s only room for a certain number of people.

I realise I’m being irrational.

I tried to tell Virgo Man I was fine, then burnt my finger tips on a hot tray out of the oven and cried for an hour.

I think knowing your parents aren’t invincible is one of the hardest ideas to get used to.

Just knowing that I need to write it, to get out of my head and maybe someone else feels the same way too.

But this pregnancy isn’t progressing the way I thought it would. Don’t panic, the baby’s fine. It’s me that’s the problem.

I had such expectations for when I was pregnant. From working in the natural health industry, I thought I had it all sorted. Healthy food, lots of exercise, vitamins, etc etc etc. The weight of expectation has crushed me and the mother guilt that I thought I would be immune to seems to start the moment you see the lines on the stick you just peed on.

I feel guilty that the only food I could hold down when I had morning sickness was McDonald’s chips.

I feel guilty that I’m too tired to exercise, go to yoga, do anything besides go to bed when I get home from work.

I feel guilty that I’ve cried nearly every day for the past week, and I don’t know how much of it I can blame on normal pregnancy hormones.

I’m possibly a little too in tune with my body that I can feel every ligament stretching, every organ changing shape, every function altering to accommodate this baby and most of them make me worry.

I’m scared that if I’m uncomfortable at 16 weeks I don’t know how I will cope when I’m 20, 30, 40 weeks?

I’m scared that if I’m an emotional wreck now, how am I going to cope when it’s just me, the baby, and a lack of sleep?

I’m sick of other peoples opinions, no matter how well meaning they are, about whether I find out the sex of the baby (I want a surprise, apparently that makes me strange), the looks and comments I get if I mention I’m researching vaccination (heaven forbid I should be informed, clearly I just want my baby to die of whooping cough, or maybe just infect some other innocent cherub with it, although surely if they’ve had the vaccination they shouldn’t have to worry?!) when I should go back to work (as quickly as possible apparently, this could be more of a staffing issue rather than about me..), the sniggers I get if I say I want to try for a natural, drug free birth.

Anyway.

Thanks for listening. I’m trying to stop doing this in front of Virgo Man as he has no idea what to do when I cry. And I don’t like to do it over the phone to my mum, because then she feels guilty about being in another state.

The hardest part of being pregnant so far is not being able to tell anyone. Trying to wait until the 12 week point is like torture. When it’s someone else’s secret, I can take it to the grave. My own secrets I want to sing from the rooftops. Surely this is strange behaviour being a Scorpio Rising?

Anyway, I had to tell my boss today. We were doing dry needling techniques in a class around the sacrum, and I knew it was a contraindication for me. It was also awkward to tell him as we’d been in meetings all week about me getting a bit of a promotion. I’d been sitting in these meetings knowing I wouldn’t be here after October.

But it was all ok. He gave me a big hug and congratulated me. Made a joke that it wouldn’t get me out of doing my work. It was such a relief to tell him. It has eased the urge to tell people for a while….